Bloomberg reporters Alex Tanzi and Mackenzie Hawkins spotlight a paper by graduate student Evan J. Soltas and his colleague Gopi Shah Goda discussing Covid-19’s impact on the labor market. The researchers “found that workers who miss a full week because of COVID are about 7 percentage points less likely to be employed a year later,” writes Tanzi and Hawkins.
MIT researchers have developed a new approach to vaccines that uses “a machine learning twist [that] could put an end to boosters and seasonal variant shots,” reports Devin Coldewey for TechCrunch.
New research by Prof. David Autor explores how the wage gap narrowed during the Covid-19 pandemic, reports Justin Lahart for The Wall Street Journal. Lahart writes that the findings suggest that “even as the pandemic fades, competition for low-wage workers will be more intense than before the pandemic. That could lead to further reductions in income inequality, raise labor costs at firms that employ low-wage workers, and reshape the U.S. business landscape.”
Writing for Fortune, Prof. Elazer R. Edelman and Mike Mussallem of Edwards Lifesciences write that the backlog of deferred medical treatments caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and resulting long-term health consequences could impact public health for years. Edelman and Mussallem emphasize that “it is incumbent upon us to identify timely real-world evidence to elucidate the effects of policy changes so they can be adaptive and agile enough to provide access to critical interventions and procedures.”
Graduate student Karenna Groff ‘22 has been named NCAA Woman of the Year, an honor presented to a graduating female student-athlete who has distinguished herself in athletics, academics, leadership and community service, reports Matt Doherty for The Boston Globe. “I think the award is the first recognition I’ve gotten that looks into who I am and who I want to be,” says Groff. “I think it will help me frame the direction towards what I want the next chapter in my life to look like.”
Graduate student Karenna Groff ’22 speaks with CBS Boston reporter Mike UVA about her academic and athletic accomplishments. “Groff become just the sixth Division III student-athlete ever to be recognized as the NCAA Woman of the Year,” says Uva. “An honor that celebrates excellence both on and off the field for all divisions.”
Writing for the Daily News, Prof. Carlo Ratti and Harvard Prof. Edward Glaeser highlight a new report by the “New” New York Panel aimed at reimagining New York City. “This is the moment to embrace the ‘New’ New York Panel’s three-pronged approach of reducing the unnecessary regulations that limit entrepreneurship, investing in New York’s children and creating exciting, safe, walkable streetscapes,” Ratti and Glaeser write.
In an article for The Boston Globe, Prof. Yasheng Huang examines the size, scale and impact of the protests underway in China. “The protests may not have damaged the foundation of the Communist Party rule, but they are a sign that the trust people have in their government, in its capacity to solve problems and its ability to safeguard the public’s welfare, has eroded,” writes Huang.
Writing for The New York Times, Prof. Yasheng Huang examines the roots of the protests underway in China. “Covid protests are occurring at the height of China’s autocratic moment. While there are calls for free speech and elections, the rallying cry since Sunday has been against a jarring oppression: the incarceration of hundreds of millions of people in their homes and in field hospitals.”
Katin Miller ’99, general manager for the Amazon fulfillment center in Fall River, speaks with Boston 25 reporter Robert Goulston about how the Covid-19 pandemic has impacted holiday shopping. “What has changed a lot is people buy bigger things online than they used to,” says Miller. “Every year is bigger than the previous year so these are record breaking volumes absolutely.”
Researchers at MIT have found indoor humidity levels can influence the transmission of Covid-19, reports Dennis Thompson for US News & World Report. “We found that even when considering countries with very strong versus very weak Covid-19 mitigation policies, or wildly different outdoor conditions, indoor — rather than outdoor — relative humidity maintains an underlying strong and robust link with Covid-19 outcomes,” explains Prof. Lydia Bourouiba.
MIT researchers have found that relative humidity “may be an important metric in influencing the transmission of Covid-19,” reports Sophie Mellor for Fortune, “Maintaining an indoor relative humidity between 40% and 60% – a Goldilocks climate, not too humid, not too dry – is associated with relatively lower rates of Covid-19 infections and deaths,” writes Mellor.
A study by Prof. Emery Brown suggests that the combination of Covid-19 and anesthesia could prompt the human brain into a state of quiet that can last weeks or months, similar to how turtles quiet their neurons to survive winter, reports Carl Zimmer for The New York Times. The findings “might point to new ways to save people from brain damage: by intentionally putting people into this state, rather than doing so by accident.”
Principal research scientist Leo Anthony Celi speaks with Associated Press reporter Maddie Burakoff about how pulse oximeters can provide inaccurate readings in patients of color. Celi highlights how oxygen levels can also be measured by drawing blood out of an artery in the wrist, the “gold standard” for accuracy, but a method that is a a bit trickier and more painful.
Biobot, a sewage data company co-founded by Mariana Matus PhD ’18 and Newsha Ghaeli PhD ’17, uses wastewater analysis to track the spread of Covid-19, reports Faye Flam for Bloomberg. “This kind of data gives Covid-cautious people the information they need to reduce their risk,” writes Flam.